Potato Varieties - What's the Difference?
There are many potato varieties available to the backyard vegetable gardener. We encourage you to try several different kinds to find out which is your favorite. Here is a list of some of the more common varieties, along with descriptions and use recommendations:
- Red Luna - this newer variety is ready in about 70 days, red skin with golden flesh, slightly oblong potatoes with low moisture content, plants show good disease resistance and tend to be high yielding, good choice for frying and roasting
- Huckleberry - these potatoes have a bright, red skin and light red flesh, good for baking, frying and mashing
- All Blue - these medium-sized potatoes have a purple skin and deep blue flesh, good for baking and mashed, flesh turns more pale the longer it cooks, ready in 90 days
- Midnight Moon - ready in 70 days, this newer variety is available exclusively from Burpee and features a deep purple skin and golden flesh, potatoes have high moisture content and are good for baking and mashing, high yields
- Daisy Gold - quite large potato with gold colored flesh and a light brown skin, good for baking, mashed, frying and roasting, ready in 80 days, available exclusively from Burpee
- Kennebec - very popular variety, white flesh and brown skin, good option for baking or roasting, potatoes are fairly round, plants have good disease resistance, heavy producer, ready in 80 days
- Red Pontiac - thin red skin and white flesh, good for boiling, roasting, mashing and frying, very popular variety of red potato, stores well, ready in 80 days,
- Yukon Gold - very desirable potato variety, large potato with yellow flesh and thin brown skin, good for baking, mashing, boiling, frying and roasting, our favorite all-purpose potato, ready in 100 days and worth the wait
- Russet - large potato with brown skin and white flesh, good for baking and mashing, these are usually the baking potatoes served at steakhouses, ready in 85 days, skin tends to be thicker
- German Butterball - very good round potato with tan skin and yellow flesh, buttery with moderate moisture content, ready in 85 days, good steamed, baked or fried, excellent choice for new potatoes
Click here to learn about planting potatoes
Click here to learn about watering and mulching potato plants
Click here for information about fertilizing potatoes
Click here to learn about harvesting potatoes
Click here for potato recipe ideas
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